Oligonucleotides are useful in therapeutic, diagnostic, research, and new and nanomaterials applications. The use of natural sequences of DNA or RNA is limited by their stability to nucleases. Additionally, in vitro studies have shown that the properties of antisense nucleotides such as binding affinity, sequence specific binding to the complementary RNA, stability to nucleases are affected by the configurations of the phosphorous atoms. Therefore, there is a need in the field for methods to produce oligonucleotides which are stereocontrolled at phosphorus and exhibit desired stability to degradation while retaining affinity for exogenous or endogenous complementary DNA/RNA sequences. There is a need for these compounds to be easily synthesized on solid support or in solution, and to permit a wide range of synthetic modifications on the sugars or nucleobases of the oligonucleotide.
Described herein are stereocontrolled syntheses of phosphorous atom-modified polymeric and oligomeric nucleic acids, which in some embodiments, is performed on solid support.